Hard to handle this airplane - Language Warning

[G]

The only sound is the music which might be offensive to some. Turn the sound down to avoid hearing "language".

The song is "She F'ing hates me"!!!!!

[oxfordmach]

jeezzz that did not look like much fun

[G]

Originally Posted by oxfordmach

jeezzz that did not look like much fun

Nope, I've never flown the U2 but have a bunch-0-time in sailplanes and they never abused me like that.

[MRS.SHKR]

why'd he get arrested?

[gbranton]

Anybody else notice that the chase vehicles at the 1:40 mark were Mustangs? SSP coupes. These are among the rarest SSPs.

http://www.sspmustang.org/features/USAF_SSP.htm

[MRS.SHKR]

Originally Posted by gbranton

Anybody else notice that the chase vehicles at the 1:40 mark were Mustangs? SSP coupes. These are among the rarest SSPs.

http://www.sspmustang.org/features/USAF_SSP.htm

good eye!

[Bill Hamilton]

When I was on C-141's years ago we had a pilot who was a former U-2 guy and he said it was the most difficult aircraft in the inventory to fly and land. You had to fly it into the ground because it would get into ground effect and "hover" forever.

He said at altitude (80,000 feet plus) you had about a plus or minus 5 knot window you had to maintain between stall and mach compressibility. It would either fall out of the air or start bucking for being on the "mach" (speed of sound). I flew many support missions for those guys (and the "Habu's") out of Beale AFB many years ago. I heard some fantastic and unbelieveable story's in O'club back then. Their's were even better that the Blackbird stories (LOL).

That's a great video, thanks for posting it.

[FlyMACH1]

Cool - I learned something today. U2's are a bich to land! :THUMBSUP:

[gbranton]

Originally Posted by Bill Hamilton

I flew many support missions for those guys (and the "Habu's") out of Beale AFB many years ago. I heard some fantastic and unbelieveable story's in O'club back then. Their's were even better that the Blackbird stories (LOL).

Two good books:

"Spy Flights Of The Cold War" by Paul Lashmar

"SR-71: Stories, Tales and legends" by Rich Graham

[G]

Originally Posted by Bill Hamilton

When I was on C-141's years ago we had a pilot who was a former U-2 guy and he said it was the most difficult aircraft in the inventory to fly and land. You had to fly it into the ground because it would get into ground effect and "hover" forever.

He said at altitude (80,000 feet plus) you had about a plus or minus 5 knot window you had to maintain between stall and mach compressibility. It would either fall out of the air or start bucking for being on the "mach" (speed of sound). I flew many support missions for those guys (and the "Habu's") out of Beale AFB many years ago. I heard some fantastic and unbelieveable story's in O'club back then. Their's were even better that the Blackbird stories (LOL).

That's a great video, thanks for posting it.

I was an airplane flyer before becoming a military aviator in helicopters and I think a few hundred hours in helicopters makes you smooth as glass with the airplanes. We have some AF QA instructors we share our "Army" C12 with and they are pretty amazed at the results we get from putting our helicopter pilots through a short FW course. Most of the high time guys fly better than the AF transition guys. That's just hands on stick and rudder stuff. The AF transition guys are much better with "air sense".

The AF guys I fly with tend to be in the 900-1900 hour range. I'm the low time guy in my office with 10400ish military and another 3800ish civilian. Somehow they think we're all helicopter guys that just started flying airplanes recently. Until we go flying.

[G]

Originally Posted by FlyMACH1

Cool - I learned something today. U2's are a bich to land! :THUMBSUP:

Well --- he was operating single-engine with the sun in his eyes and a bucket on his melon.

[Bill Hamilton]

Originally Posted by G

I was an airplane flyer before becoming a military aviator in helicopters and I think a few hundred hours in helicopters makes you smooth as glass with the airplanes. We have some AF QA instructors we share our "Army" C12 with and they are pretty amazed at the results we get from putting our helicopter pilots through a short FW course. Most of the high time guys fly better than the AF transition guys. That's just hands on stick and rudder stuff. The AF transition guys are much better with "air sense".

The AF guys I fly with tend to be in the 900-1900 hour range. I'm the low time guy in my office with 10400ish military and another 3800ish civilian. Somehow they think we're all helicopter guys that just started flying airplanes recently. Until we go flying.

Air Force pilots today are more "Data Managers" than real "stick and rudder men". It pains me greatly to admit that but many of them will tell you the same thing. They're getting thousands of hours at "cruise". Helo guys are the last of the great hand flyers.

I recently took a group of A.F. Air War College students over to Europe and dropped them off at Oxford (really Brize Norton RAF). There was one Army aviator in the group who was an Apache guy attending the school at Maxwell. I forgot to ask him if he knew you. I think he had a line number for 0-6 as he was going back to your neck of the woods as BN Commander when he finishes up. Fun guy, we swapped war stories and Jagermeister/beer all night. He was spending the week there, while I returned stateside the next day in a C-17 "horizontal" for a majority of the flight with a major headache. We may not have drank all the beer in England but we did cause a temporary shortage that night.

[G]

Bill, I'm pretty well known. If they really know me they start out with "that S oh B".

It's kinda neat because now I see 05's and 06's that I gave checkrides either in flight school or the Test Pilot Course. Thank God I'm a civilian now and REALLY don't have to hear their crap.

Even the helicopters are getting to be overly augmented.

I never seem to get by your area of the country recently. I'm at Langley and MacDill about once a quarter and make a bunch of flights out to Fort Bliss but I never seem to stop along the way. My boss wouldn't mind stopping by but most places come unglued when a GO is in the group.

[Bill Hamilton]

Originally Posted by G

.................

I never seem to get by your area of the country recently. I'm at Langley and MacDill about once a quarter and make a bunch of flights out to Fort Bliss but I never seem to stop along the way. My boss wouldn't mind stopping by but most places come unglued when a GO is in the group.

Geoff, I see a lot of Army helo's across the ramp parking on the General Aviation ramp side but not many on the military ramp. We still seem to be one of the choice RON's for cross-country training flights to many of the UPT camps out there be it Army, Navy, or Air Force.

[Azure Blurr]

Do they get hazard pay x10?

That is nuts!

[Troll]

I can't believe that thing's still in our inventory.

Originally Posted by MRS.SHKR

why'd he get arrested?

Pretty sure that was a joke. Looks like the "cops" were other pilots.

[MRS.SHKR]

Originally Posted by Troll

I can't believe that thing's still in our inventory.



Pretty sure that was a joke. Looks like the "cops" were other pilots.

Kinda thought so

[Bill Hamilton]

Originally Posted by MRS.SHKR

Kinda thought so

The U-2 (now called TR-1) is probably one of the most difficult aircraft to learn to fly and land as I mentioned above in a previous post above. The Air Force actually has a small fleet of hi-performance vehicles that sit in the over-run on runways and "talk" the aircraft down on landings. Once the U-2/TR-1 crosses the overrun, they accelerate down the runway below and behind the aircraft talking to the pilots the entire time giving them foot by foot altitude/cross winds and other pertinent information to help them land. In the late sixties/early seventies I know they had a few Ford Rancheros powered with 428 Cobra Jets to act as chase vehicles and later SS 396 El Camino's. In the late eighties they went with 5.0 LX Mustangs for a few years. The nineties saw the arrival of Z-28 Camaro's. I believe they now have some LS-2 GTO's to chase with.



There was an '88 model 5.0 LX used by Base Ops at Patrick AFB Fla back in the early 90's that I had a little fun with while TDY there one time.

[Troll]

Originally Posted by Bill Hamilton

The U-2 (now called TR-1) is probably one of the most difficult aircraft to learn to fly and land as I mentioned above in a previous post above. The Air Force actually has a small fleet of hi-performance vehicles that sit in the over-run on runways and "talk" the aircraft down on landings. Once the U-2/TR-1 crosses the overrun, they accelerate down the runway below and behind the aircraft talking to the pilots the entire time giving them foot by foot altitude/cross winds and other pertinent information to help them land. In the late sixties/early seventies I know they had a few Ford Rancheros powered with 428 Cobra Jets to act as chase vehicles and later SS 396 El Camino's. In the late eighties they went with 5.0 LX Mustangs for a few years. The nineties saw the arrival of Z-28 Camaro's. I believe they now have some LS-2 GTO's to chase with.

There was an '88 model 5.0 LX used by Base Ops at Patrick AFB Fla back in the early 90's that I had a little fun with while TDY there one time.

I thought those cars were just there to catch a wing.

They should've named it the Albatross.

[Bill Hamilton]

Originally Posted by Troll

I thought those cars were just there to catch a wing.

They should've named it the Albatross.

The earlier model U-2's had "pogo stick" wheels stuck under outboard the wings which fell off on take off. This was one of the weight saving items to gain more altitude. Those models used the Ranchero's and El Camino's to talk them down and then a couple of guys would jump out the back of the vehicle and keep the wings tips from tipping over as the plane came to a stop and while others would re-attach the pogos. The later model U-2's and TR-1's had outboard riggers built into the outer portion of the wing and a large fast truck type vehicle to catch the aircraft and carry the workers was not needed. That was when the Mustang's and Camaros started to be used.

The Air Force had another aircraft back in the 1940's thru the early 60's named the Albatross. Is was the Sa-16 and it was a seaplane used for air sea rescue.

[Troll]

Well thank you for the history lesson, sir.

[Lord Umoja]

That looked nuts. I'm a low time (113hrs) private pilot and know about odd landings. My home airport is in a weird shapped valley and can get some wicked cross winds. Actually had an instructor teching my cross wind landings before I got my license and I remember him having trouble and then hearing..."Humm thats odd........I'm out of rudder..." Best thing about the airport was the stand of trees at the one end. To land in one direction you had the clear the trees and then side-slip the plane to loose altitude, before your roundoff to landing. Scared the **** out of my instructor out in AZ when I was at school.

The guy never spoke except for when I messed up. Thanks to that teaching style, my landings are usually glass smooth, and I get compliments from passengers often.

[Brown7]

they have blue Camaro's in korea...never imagined them having that much trouble landing..but maybe it was just because i only saw them hovering over our side of the runway and not actually landing